Grieving Barre mom pleads for addicts to change course

Monday

Aug 25, 2014 at 6:00 AMAug 25, 2014 at 10:15 PM

By Susan Spencer TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

BARRE — Amy J. Reed was grateful that the most horrific event of her life — her 27-year-old son's fatal heroin overdose — took place in another town. That way, people she knew so well, Barre police and fire personnel, didn't have to be the ones trying to revive him.

Nicholas Thomas Crawford, known as Nick, died March 23 after using heroin at a friend's house in neighboring Hardwick.

Mrs. Reed works as an administrative assistant for Barre's chief of police. She said, "Nick was 10 months old when I started working here. He spent many a Christmas Eve here with me when I had to work."

Mrs. Reed and her husband, Joseph P. Reed, who live in Hubbardston now, spoke with a reporter about Nick's battle with heroin and prescription painkillers to raise awareness of the widespread reach of addiction.

The Reeds, along with Mrs. Reed's 32-year-old daughter, Jessica, and Nick's father and stepmother, have also been raising money through a motorcycle ride and personal donations for Project Purple. The initiative is an outreach program of the Rhode Island-based nonprofit, The Herren Project, founded by former NBA basketball player, Chris Herren, that assists individuals and families struggling with addiction.

Mrs. Reed pleads with young adults: "Please don't do to your mother what's happening to me."

She said, "The little bit that I can do, making small monetary donations and talking to people about it, maybe it's a minute thing, but it's what I can do. You've got to start somewhere."

"It was surreal to them," Mr. Reed said about Nick's friends' reaction to his death. "When they could see how strong he was and now he's dead — they saw their own mortality."

Mrs. Reed fondly shared a photo collage of Nick's early years, recalling happier moments. There was Nick as a toddler sitting on the Easter Bunny's lap. Here he was running through a backyard sprinkler. There were many photos of Nick in Halloween costumes that Mrs. Reed had made by hand: a vampire, a cowboy; and always grinning alongside friends and relatives.

Nick grew up on one of Barre's secluded back roads near the Hardwick/Petersham end of town, Mrs. Reed explained, and he used to get frustrated that his mother wouldn't drive him "downtown" so he could hang out.

"I didn't want him to hang around town and get in trouble," she said.

Nick attended Quabbin Regional High School, although he didn't graduate because he would have had to go to summer school after his senior year to get enough credits. He got his GED instead and went to work installing pellet stoves, eventually becoming a certified welder.

Nick got a good job with Rockwerx in Barre, installing climbing walls and traveling widely.

"He wasn't like what I used to think of as a heroin addict," Mrs. Reed said. "His girlfriend didn't know. She confronted him on a trip (when she discovered it): 'Either you get off of this or we're breaking up.'"

She continued: "You don't always know. Nick never got into trouble. He had a job. He looked healthy and fine."

"Nick was a chameleon. Looking in hindsight, you can figure this out. But back then, you couldn't," Mr. Reed said. "He would do it (shoot up) between his fingers and toes, where it wouldn't show."

In April 2013, Nick called his mother saying he wanted to come over that evening and talk. She thought maybe it was something such as his girlfriend was pregnant.

Instead, he told her, "I need help. I'm addicted to heroin."

He also said he'd had a problem with prescription drugs before that, but pills were expensive and heroin was cheap and easy to get.

Through friends in Worcester, Mr. Reed helped get Nick into detox that night at Spectrum Health Systems. He stayed for five days, but didn't want to commit to the next level of rehab.

"That's not enough treatment," Mr. Reed said.

Nick returned to stay with the Reeds, apparently clean, before tensions developed and he left to stay with friends in Hardwick that the Reeds knew used drugs.

The Reeds petitioned the East Brookfield District Court to order him to further treatment. But because he wasn't overdosing, stealing or committing other crimes, the judge denied the petition.

"They said he's not a harm to himself or others," Mr. Reed said. "There's nowhere to send him."

"That was frustrating, that we tried to get him help," said Mrs. Reed. "He was a good person that liked to do drugs. He worked to get money for drugs."

In July 2013, Nick moved in with his sister, got his job back with conditions that he be regularly drug tested, not travel with people known to use drugs, and have someone else — in this case his sister — manage his money. He started to rebuild his life.

"He put his weight back on, and then I could see it. At first it's gradual so I didn't notice it," Mrs. Reed said.

His financial situation improved, too, after he stopped spending money on drugs. "When he died, he had $7,000 to $8,000 in the bank. When he was using, he was always $500 in the red and had stories about not being reimbursed yet for travel expenses."

She continued: "But they lie. I thought that's the one thing we had: He wouldn't lie to me. I asked, "Why did you lie?'

"He said, 'I didn't want to disappoint you.'"

Mrs. Reed said that after Nick died, she was furious at the friends she believed enabled his use. But she said she could hear Nick saying, "Mom, I did it. So don't be mad at them."

One of Nick's friends promptly got into treatment after his death. His parents head to Worcester at 4:30 a.m. everyday to take him for Suboxone therapy.

More than 400 people came to Nick's wake and many shared memories on Nick's Facebook page, which Mrs. Reed printed and keeps in a notebook.

"It was nice to see that people loved him as much as I did," she said.

"I didn't realize how silly he was. He'd send out those pictures and funny notes. ... He loved life."

She added that Nick had talked about settling down and planning to marry his girlfriend after his job on the road ended.

He always ended conversations with his mother by saying he loved her, and he said his next tattoo was going to say "Momma's boy."

"So on his urn for his ashes it says his name, the year of his birth and death, and 'Momma's boy,' " Mrs. Reed said.

Mr. and Mrs. Reed feel frustrated that more can't be done to get drugs off the streets.

Mrs. Reed wrote in an email: "The police really are trying hard but there just isn't enough time in the day, there isn't anywhere near enough police officers in each town to put the amount of time and effort into what needs to be done to get the drug program under control ... It's such a huge battle and they are so limited by all the laws and rights that are in place that help to protect the bad guys/drug dealers and make it extremely hard for police to get the upper hand."

She said, "Something has to change."

Contact Susan Spencer at susan.spencer@telegram.com. Follow her on Twitter @SusanSpencerTG.